You Hurt My Feelings

 

Writer/director Nicole Holofcener

Holofcener with Julia Louis-Dreyfus

YOU HURT MY FEELINGS             C                                                                                    USA  (93 mi)  2023  d: Nicole Holofcener

The whole world is falling apart, and this is what’s consuming you?                                          —Don (Tobias Menzies)

In an era where it’s often hard to distinguish an actual movie from television, as they’ve become one and the same, this leans decisively towards the world of television, never once actually feeling like a movie, more like a sitcom, as there’s nothing cinematic about it and instead seems designed to be seen on a small screen instead of a theater, which does not enhance the viewing experience.  From the maker of Enough Said (2013), starring Seinfeld’s own Julia Louis-Dreyfus and The Soprano’s star James Gandolfini in his final film role, it does not appear that the passage of time has done anything to improve the abilities of this director, though in her films dating struggles have now given way to parenting problems, yet there’s simply nothing imaginative about the story or the way it’s presented, where this just feels like something written exclusively for television, as it’s only mildly entertaining and largely forgettable.  Premiering at the Sundance Film Festival in 2023, the premise of the film happens to be that writers tend to be extremely insecure, where the least little criticism can send them into an emotional tailspin that sends them over the edge, questioning their talent and self-worth, always seeking personal validation, revealing our own deeply embedded insecurities in how much we value the approval of others.  Julia Louis-Dreyfus is Beth, a writer who is struggling to follow up on her last effort, which was a somewhat successful memoir about the verbal abuse she received from her father, now delving into the world of fiction with her first novel, which feels much more open-ended, like a world that’s harder to crack, and it’s causing her all kinds of anxiety and self-doubt.  Beth is also a creative writing instructor, leading a small class of would-be writers, encouraging them to read fragments of their work, exploring ideas and materials, where her role is offering creative support, even after she hilariously discovers they have never read her work.  Her husband Don (Tobias Menzies), on the other hand, is a psychotherapist, like Nanni Moretti in The Son's Room (La stanza del figlio) (2001), but finds himself alienated from his clients, whose problems interest him less and less, discovering he is less engaged, where he actually mixes up the personal histories of his patients.  Together, however, they have that happy marriage, part of New York’s middle class in Manhattan, where the city itself is a character that weaves in and out of the storyline.  Raised on the Upper West Side, Holofcener grew up as an extra on the sets of Woody Allen’s TAKE THE MONEY AND RUN (1969) and SLEEPER (1973) before working as a production assistant for A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy (1982) and assistant editor on Hannah and Her Sisters (1986), while her mother Carol Joffe was Allen’s frequent set decorator, and her stepfather Charles H. Joffe was the executive producer for fifty years of Allen’s films, placing her smack dab in the middle of a burgeoning New York City arts scene, where she was taught by none other than Martin Scorsese at Columbia University’s film school.  Much of Holofcener’s work has a realistic yet satiric style, most of it shot on location, where she seems to have built a career around superfluous characters and stunted emotional growth, creating a comedy of manners that examines the lives of the upper middle bourgeoisie, often intellectual, and from a female perspective, making seven features, though most of her work has come in television. 

While Holofcener likes to complain that nobody has seen her films, with critics suggesting that not much happens in her films, which may be filled with “little daily dramas,” or what Beth describes as her “little narcissistic world,” and while plot may not be her strong suit, much more focus is spent on character and dialogue.  Still, much like the central character in this film, she may have insecurities about her work, where the things people say matter, though in the bigger picture she may overlook much of the criticism, but when it comes from her inner circle, that makes all the difference.  Julia Louis-Dreyfus is one of the most successful comedic actresses in television history, bringing a silliness, a quirkiness, and most of all an intelligence when it comes to her screen roles, blending emotional authenticity with a heavy dose of irreverence, with Holofcener writing the part with her in mind.  While Beth is comfortable visiting bookstores, she has a habit of trying to move the location of her books into a more prominent position, offering greater accessibility to the public, which is viewed as small-minded and petty, thinking exclusively of herself, showing little regard for the other authors.  And though she has painfully been going through the rewrites on her novel, she is disappointed to learn that her publisher believes it is still in need of many more rewrites before it’s ready for publishing, immediately thinking of herself as a failure, second guessing her every move.  Her 23-year old son Eliot (Owen Teague) is a budding playwright, feeling the pressure of having a writer for a mother, unable to realize his own writing ambitions, so he works in a low-key job as a store clerk in a cannabis store, which causes his mother endless worry, as it attracts a fringe element of lowlifes and derelicts, where the lone security guard looks asleep half the time.  Beth’s sister Sarah (Michaela Watkins) is an interior designer, but faces constant rejection from demanding upscale clients, spending her days scouring the Upper West and East sides searching for just the right products, where the callousness of her clients matches the tastelessness of their choices.  Her husband Mark (Arian Moayed) is a budding actor who never seems to find work, always on the verge of professional failure, but he hangs around the fringes of the industry hoping something falls his way.  What seems apparent, however, is that everyone is suffocating from their own mediocrity.  A common thread is watching a cyclical rotation of Don’s patients, none of whom seem to get any better, perhaps best represented by real-life married couple Amber Tamblyn and David Cross in the first time they’ve appeared in a film together, who hold little love for each other, yet are inseparable, as they can’t live without complaining about their partners.  A familiar refrain that runs through this picture is an utter dissatisfaction with their work, which has a way of feeling existentially soul-crushing, mirroring the anxieties they feel about growing older, as they’re not as young and cute as they used to be, where small satisfactions loom larger, yet they can’t shake the fear that impending mortality lies around every corner.  

What really sets the wheels in motion, however, is Beth accidentally overhearing a discussion between Don and Mark, where her husband honestly confesses he really didn’t like the latest work she’s written, which hits her like a ton of bricks, as he’s been her staunchest supporter.  They’re the kind of married couple that finishes each other’s sentences, sharing one another’s food, even licking from the same ice cream cone, which drives their son nuts, finding it disgusting.  Considering the reliability of the source, feeling utterly betrayed, she falls into a depression, turning a cold shoulder, avoiding him like the plague, but refuses to share what’s on her mind, instead allowing it fester, growing passive-aggressive, where she just grows angrier and more indignant.  Her entire relationship is shaken, not knowing who to trust anymore, as the foundation of their marriage has suddenly been exposed as a lie, losing all sense of equilibrium.  None of the characters are fully developed, feeling more like caricatures, yet they continue to utter smart-assed remarks for comic value, feeling very hit or miss, where the only one in the entire film that feels real is Beth’s aging mother Georgia, played by the great Jeannie Berlin, daughter of Elaine May and so powerful in Kenneth Lonergan’s 2011 Top Ten Films of the Year #2 Margaret, as her dialogue never feels forced or couched in comedy, sounding very much like a proud Jewish mother who wants the best for her children, even as they’ve grown into fledgling adults, still filled with the same insecurities and deficiencies they had in childhood, but they’ve also developed much greater intelligence and talent.  She’s insistent that Beth’s publisher hasn’t done a good job marketing her book, urging her to seek out another, convinced that her daughter is a great writer.  And she could easily be, but you’d never know it, as none of the characters are internalized or self-reflective, feeling very surface level, where the film is a series of incidents that only exacerbate the differences and commonalities between us, where the things that drive us apart also bring us together, where there’s a thin line between love and hate.  Julia Louis-Dreyfus is the center of the picture, with everything revolving around her, and, as always, she’s commercially appealing, observant of those around her, like a stand-in for the director, where this single incident has made her question everything in their relationship, dredging up the past, where suddenly everything is seen in a new and different light.  Everyone feels the need to be valued, in all aspects of our existence, where doubt, or silence, upsets our feelings.  A film about trust, lies, and the things we say to the people we love most, where encouragement is not always supported by the truth, oftentimes hiding our true feelings with little white lies, yet offering our full support, irrespective of how we feel, is what matters most, as we want the best out of those closest to us.  None of this is revelatory or earth-shaking, or particularly profound, but it’s ensconced in a feel-good air of white-privileged, middle class contentment.

Enough Said

ENOUGH SAID          B   
USA  (93 mi)  2013  d:  Nicole Holofcener             Official site

What’s perhaps most interesting about the film are the circumstances surrounding the making of the film, as who would have ever thought that Julia Louis-Dreyfus, the only female lead character from the infamous TV comedy sitcom Seinfeld (1989 – 1998), a show that for all practical purposes was about nothing, would somehow be starring in a movie opposite James Gandolfini from The Sopranos (1999 – 2007, the cable TV show that ranks among the greatest ever, a mob crime boss with a hair-trigger temper whose anger issues are notorious, and who personally executes about a dozen people on the show.  Louis-Dreyfus hasn’t made a movie since Woody Allen’s DECONSTRUCTING HARRY (1997), so the likelihood of these two crossing paths was highly unlikely, yet here they are starring opposite one another, and it happens to be the final film of Gandolfini’s career due to his premature death.  Brilliant as he was in Zero Dark Thirty (2012), Not Fade Away (2012), and Killing Them Softly (2012), Gandolfini is often at his best when showing a tender and vulnerable side, where he’s a gentle giant of a man capable of genuine sweetness that can sweep you off your feet.  Despite a formidable screen prominence throughout the film, one gets the feeling that it’s not enough, that we wish there could be more, where it’s hard to believe that this is the end.  But it’s a very classy role that Gandolfini fits to a T, as he’s a perfect fit for the part of Albert, a divorced husband living alone in a modest home while his ex-wife Marianne (Catherine Keener) and beautiful teenage daughter Tess (Eve Hewson, Bono’s daughter) live in a luxurious estate in Santa Monica overlooking the ocean.  He allows them to indulge in all the luxury, which they most certainly do, while he lives a completely unpretentious life.  The film, however, is seen through the eyes of Eva (Louis-Dreyfus), another divorced single parent who works as a masseuse, whose most distinctive characteristic is the ability to quietly listen to the endless gripes and moans of her customers complaining about their banal lives without so much as uttering a peep in response. 

The rhythm of the film is established by Eva’s routine of visiting her various clients, each with a distinct personality that includes something that usually grates on her nerves but she never speaks of it, where we see her endlessly lugging around her portable table before arriving back home to her daughter Ellen (Tracey Fairaway), who’s on the verge of leaving home for Sarah Lawrence University.  While Eva has a close relationship with her daughter, who often appears more grounded and stable than her mother, she has issues about being alone afterwards, as if she’s supposed to have “found herself,” instead of feeling restless about her all but uncertain future.  At a party, she meets a new guy, Albert, though at the time she claims there are no attractive men at the party, and feels, at least initially, like he’s fat and overweight, as if he doesn’t take care of himself, but he’s also funny and really easy to get along with.  At the same time, she also meets an interesting writer, Marianne, who lives in a fabulously upscale home where everything is perfectly in place, where it’s like the ideal dream home for Eva, as it’s unbelievably comfortable for the masseuse as well.  Eva quickly becomes fast friends with both, initially not sure about Albert, but their quick wit quickly escalates into a romantic affair, while everything about finding Marianne is like she hit the motherlode.  In addition, Eva latches onto her daughter’s best friend Chloe (Tavi Gevinson), who really dreads her own homelife and basically never goes home, where Chloe’s more straightforward and emotionally communicative than her own daughter, all of which gives Eva a certain stature, as if she’s a strong and stable force, yet Louis-Dreyfus has made a living doing insecure comedy, where her character usually unravels in a spectacular meltdown of sorts, yet here, despite her most anxious fears, she holds her own and easily carries the picture. 

While Eva and Albert have plenty in common, divorcées with intelligent daughters that are about to leave for prestigious universities, each unable to fathom what they ever found in their ex-spouses, as they have so little in common with them today, completely at odds in parenting techniques which led to most of the endless marital arguments.   Unbeknownst to Eva, Marianna and Albert were once married, and the guy she continually rails against during her masseuse sessions is Albert, which puts him at a distinct disadvantage and in an entirely different light, as he’s not there to defend himself.  In fact, like all the other problems and complaints she hears, Eva listens but says nothing, irregardless of potential consequences.  While all the actors have a natural affinity for authenticity, including Toni Collette as Eva’s best friend, who even retains her Australian accent, the movie also hits all the narrative notes of impending middle age, where one has had to rebound from past mistakes, where friends are few as relationships didn’t turn out the way they expected, and one has had to navigate their way through an unpleasant divorce while sharing the job of raising children.  Sexual relations have imploded, where marriage seems to be a place where sex literally goes to die, and there’s plenty of bitter sarcasm in its place.  Throughout these mainstream perceptions that are fodder for any number of television shows and movies, this well written but overly conventional film doesn’t really reach for more, but settles for easy going laughs, a few moments of comic wit, and plenty of awkward sequences that are meant to show how relentlessly unforgiving people can be, especially at middle age when they have been through all this before, and the idea of being undermined or hurt again simply doesn’t sit well as one’s idea of a healthy relationship.  Due to the quality of the performances, even when underwritten, the actors carry it off, especially Gandolfini and Louis-Dreyfus, as their screen presence is so appealing.  It does feel bittersweet seeing someone's last and final performance, especially one where the actor seems so perfectly comfortable in the role, which adds a heightened poignancy to his character, as in every screen or theatrical performance, whether full throttle male macho or the most tender moments, Gandolfini exhibits an indomitable spirit that leaves the audience wishing for more.